


A war within a war

by sagiow



Category: A Discovery of Witches (TV), All Souls Trilogy - Deborah Harkness, Mercy Street (TV)
Genre: AU, Civil War, F/M, I assume Abraham Lincoln is a Vampire Hunter too, in the world of ADoW
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:42:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28141812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sagiow/pseuds/sagiow
Summary: "It begins with absence and desire. It begins with blood and fear." -Deborah Harkness
Relationships: Emma Green/Henry Hopkins, Jedediah "Jed" Foster/Mary Phinney
Comments: 3
Kudos: 3
Collections: Mercy Street Crossover Advent Silver and AU





	A war within a war

“You’ll never know what happened today!” Emma exclaimed by way of greeting, as she half-stormed into Henry’s study, before coming to an abrupt halt, her hand still clasping the door handle. “Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t know you were busy.”

The trio looked up pleasantly from their cups and biscuits at the unexpected intruder. The afternoon was drawing to an end, yet it was as if the sun had simply given up on rising altogether, on this gloomy, wet December day. At least, a bright fire warmed the simple room, and the three had rounded close to it for a moment’s respite.

“Busy’s a bit of a stretch,” Jed grinned, reclining into his seat as Henry had jumped from his. “Just reviving our spirits over a warm beverage after a challenging albeit successful surgery.”

“Would you care to join us?” Mary enjoined from the doctor’s side on the worn couch, the teapot already in hand. “I think I speak for all of us when I say you have us quite intrigued with that lively introduction.”

She watched the young nurse hesitate, the older - oh, so much older- preacher waiting with more than baited breath upon her answer, and could feel Jed’s mischievous mirth like bubbles bursting on her cheek. 

“Or was this good gossip for our stern Reverend’s ears only?” she heard him say, and inwardly both cursed and cheered him. 

The glare Henry shot them both turned the bubbles to ice, leaving an invisible trail of frost along her face, which she wiped subtly with the palm of a hand warmed from holding her cup.

“Oh, no, not at all,” Emma stammered, oblivious to all this. “I’ll… I’ll gladly have some tea, Nurse Mary, if you are all quite sure I am not imposing.” 

“You never could.” Within a second, Henry had another chair at the ready next to his, and she accepted it, with a briefly bewildered frown, the professed steaming cup soon after.

“Thank you,” she smiled at them all, and waited with barely restrained eagerness for Henry to back sit down as well. “Well, what happened was, there was quite the commotion in the ward.”

“Did you wear a hoopskirt again?” 

The sound Henry emitted could only be described as a snarl, as Emma hid her annoyance in her cup, and immediately brightened up. “Mulled wine?! It’s delicious! So in season! Is that… star anise? And cloves?”

“Amongst many other spices and barks,” Mary confirmed. “Old family recipe. A taste of home for Chaplain Hopkins and I as the weather seems quite intent on withholding from us anything remotely akin to a New England Christmas. But please, do continue with your story; I give you my word that Dr. Foster will hold his tongue.” His smile only widened, the challenge, accepted.

Emma did not hesitate for long, her keenness in sharing the news spilling over as the wine in her saucer. “Yes, so, we had some new arrivals this afternoon. A handful of men, who half-deserted their regiment. Bursted through the doors _screaming._ Some were positively hysterical!”

“Hmm, that term cannot truly apply to men… you see, hyster-” Jed began, before brusquely cutting himself short, and falling mute. The bubbles bombarded Mary once more, an angry flurry of irate butterflies assailing her, but she paid them no mind, her attention fully consumed otherwise. 

“Nonetheless,” Emma continued, her tone darkening, “they were all frantic. Panicked. They said there had been an attack two nights prior, but it was no Southern raid. The soldier that had held watch was found dead the next morning, mere feet away from his post, a ghastly gash on his neck… completely drained of his blood.”

Mary gasped and lost her focus. “Drained of blood?” Jed repeated, now that he could.

If Henry could have paled anymore, he would have. “An animal, surely,” he offered.

“That’d leave the body there, otherwise untouched?” Emma countered, looking at him dubiously. “All agreed it made no sense. Neither did an enemy attack, as he was the only victim and they’d all been asleep, and so would’ve been an easy conquest. But their captain dismissed their worries, told them to get back to their post for another night. But then this morning… he was dead as well.”

“Of the same injury?” Mary asked reticently.

“No! With his limbs broken and his entrails torn out.”

A cold shiver ran down Mary’s body, before Henry’s gaze returned to Emma, pressing her silently to continue. “So they abandoned everything, came running into town, into the hospital, screaming “Captain Proctor’s dead! Creatures, monsters among us!””

“Monsters!” Jed chuckled into his wine. “So what now, pitchforks and torches? Start piling up wood for the pyres? Toss a coin to your Witcher?”

“Before we get to that, and we very well might, considering the frenzy they caused, I was hoping a few comforting words from the Good Book might bring them to their senses,” Emma said, turning to the graver than usual chaplain.

“To reassure them there are no such things as creatures and monsters?” he said, with a hint of an edge. “The Bible actually speaks quite the opposite, with its description of demons and serpents, of four-faced cherubim and six-winged seraphim…” He stopped himself as he caught her eye, the hesitation and fear it held, and sighed as he stood. “Of course, you are right, Miss Green. I’ll think of something to fortify them in their faith. Where can I find them?”

Emma followed suit. “Thank you, Chaplain. Matron quickly took charge of things, and whisked them away to another room I was not even aware we had. I’ll lead you to it whenever you’re ready.”

Mary’s relief at her sister’s implication was immense, although much less enthusiastic with the house’s proclivity to hospitality. “I will go see them shortly as well and give Bridget a hand. Surely two wi- _ward_ nurses will not be too many.”

The butterflies at her neck softened, setting their wings upon her skin with the softness of so many delicate kisses, over which her breath caught. 

“I’ll come with you, see if any are injured; my skills with a scalpel are undoubtedly higher than with prayers,” said Jed as he savored the last of his drink, while the Chaplain gathered his books. “I also need to satisfy my curiosity as to whatever happened to poor… Proctor, was it?” The nudge - very real, this time- to her hand that followed next did nothing to help, the floodgates of their minds opening at the contact of their skin.

 _Stop it, before I make you do so again._ Mary replied without speaking a word. _You fully know it was Proctor._

 _I wanted to make sure you were paying attention…_ she heard him speak within herself, a troubling sensation first discovered when their fingers had brushed during a surgery, his focused yet chaotic mind suddenly shouting clearly to hers and astonishing them both. _And what about the first victim?_ _Could our dear chaplain have had a sudden deeper thirst than your fine brews can quench?_

She scoffed. _You know he does not, has not since he killed that boy in his youth. Besides, we were together at Private Harkness’s bedside then. No. There must be others nearby._

_Word of our conventicle must have gotten out to the Congregation… We are being sent a message._

At that moment, for all that she craved his touch, she pulled her hand away, intent on keeping her next thoughts her own, converting the fugue into a wave to the departing duo.

He watched them leave, smiling wistfully as he leaned further back into the couch. “I don’t need to touch you to know what troubles you, Mary Phinney,” he spoke softly when they were gone. “Although I am quite fond of it. The touching, I mean. Not the trouble. That I would very much like to soothe.”

“Well, I am not fond of either,” she lied, her hands tingling their disagreement in return. “And I still don’t understand how this can be possible. You are a daemon.”

“Could it simply be that I am a rather spectacular specimen of daemon?” he said, adjusting his embroidered waistcoat that matched the now tepid wine in her cup, the cranberry bursts in the biscuits… the free-flowing blood from a fatal wound. 

She scowled, the tingling turning to a crinkling. “Or that the Foster family has had some past special species connections.”

“Perhaps. An interesting hypothesis. But not an ancestor I expect would be claimed loudly and proudly in the family Bible. Besides,” he added, his expression turning even more roguish, “it is only our present special connection that is of interest to me.”

He reached for her again, but she rose, pulling her arm away as blue sparks shot and shimmered from her fingers, to her consternation and his utter fascination and delight. "Well, well, what do we have here?"

“I have to see to these men,” she said sternly as she shook her hands to dismiss the released, feeling-betraying energy. “And will then gather the other two witches. I suggest you and Hopkins do the same with your kin. We will all meet later tonight to discuss this, draft our plan.”

Chastised - for the time being- he nodded, but slowly, from the intensity of his dark eyes watching her, a deliberate, delicious pressure built at her temple, fluttering across her forehead; she shut her eyes as it reached them, the phantom kisses landing lovingly on her eyelids. “This is not the time for foolishness, Jed,” she almost pleaded. “Another war is upon us.”

“If that little lightshow was any indication, I'd say I'm not the one playing the fool, Mary,” he sighed, before standing as well and slipping into the woolen Union blue jacket. “But the last thing I wish is to add a third conflict to our busy battlefield. Until you speak the word, consider me as mute on the matter as you so craftily had me earlier. And until then,” he said, opening and holding the door for her, “lead us to Victory, Baroness.”

**Author's Note:**

> I’m currently reading A Discovery of Witches (last chapter!). For those of you who haven’t, the way Mary physically feels the gazes of vampires and daemons is taken from it (although daemons are more described as nudges and kisses than butterflies or bubbles); the blue sparks are from there too. The Bishop house is some kind of sensient thing and does have the ability to conjure up new rooms as needed. And vampires snarl and drink wine. 
> 
> A Conventicle is like the anti-pope to the Congregation leading the non-humans and made of 3 witches, 3 vampires and 3 daemons. So have fun giving me your ideas of who else would be in it along with these three and Bridget! (mine would be Samuel and Isabella as vampires, Byron and Anne as daemons, and Squivers as the Neville Longbottom Worst Witch of this AU)
> 
> I flirted with the idea of making the Greens a coven of vampires (because, seriously, just think about it!) but do enjoy Henry as the brooding vampire in love with a human at least equally.


End file.
